“Alexander Hart. I have infected wounds on my neck.”
She studied me. “Do you have a profession, Mr. Hart?”
“I work for Viscount Mansel.” There. She wouldn’t send me away, would she?
She turned towards Miss Harlowe. “Can you confirm that, miss?”
A fine layer of sweat glistened on Miss Harlowe’s skin. “I do. Mr. Hart is employed by my father. And I can vouch for his character.”
“Excellent.” The nurse wrote something else. “Take a seat, Mr. Hart. A nurse will call you when a doctor is available.” She handed me a ticket with a number on it. “Keep it until you are called.”
I took the ticket and traced my steps back through the hall with Miss Harlowe as quickly as possible. I didn’t want to smell blood.
“So much pain.” Her breathing became troubled.
“Too many people like on the omnibus.”
“It’s too…” She gasped and tottered on her feet, paling.
“Careful.” I took her arm to steady her, but she shook violently. “Let’s go outside. If you faint on this floor, you’ll get the clap, and it’ll be difficult to explain to your father.”
She put a hand on her stomach. “Don’t be so crass.”
“I can’t help it. It’s part of my charm.” I helped her onto a bench in a small park just outside the hospital.
She leant into me, and the urge to protect her roared to life from some remote corner inside me. I hadn’t felt anything like that since my family had died.
“There you go. Better?” My voice broke a little.
Her face turned green. A new quiver shook her. She bent over to the side and started retching, emptying her stomach behind a bush. I put a hand on her forehead as she threw up. Not sure what the hand did, but my mother had done the same thing whenever my sister or I had thrown up.
She shook again. “You don’t need to see this.”
“I slept under bridges. I ate a sandwich found on the pavement. I can handle this.” I handed her my handkerchief when she finished.
She shivered like a newborn fawn, and her breathing sounded like that of a hardened smoker. And then she started twitching on the ground.
8
CROSSES
Alex
As Miss Harlowe had a seizure, I held her head and opened her mouth to check her throat wasn’t clogged. “I’m here. For what it’s worth.”
A gaggle of boys snickered and pulled faces at Miss Harlowe’s seizure.
One of them opened his mouth.
“Shut up.” I scowled. “All of you just shut the hell up.”
They hurried away amid mutters and words they believed were insults. I hadn’t been offended by the word scoundrel since I was twelve.
When Miss Harlowe stopped kicking and twitching, I brushed her hair from her pale, soft cheeks.
“I’m sorry,” she croaked, holding the handkerchief with a trembling hand.
“You don’t have to apologise for something you can’t control.” I helped her onto the bench.
